Answering the call of Emory Washburn (Class of 1817) and Daniel Noble (Class of 1796), 70 alumni – nearly one-quarter of all then-living Williams graduates – convene in Williamstown on September 5, 1821, to form the Society of Alumni of Williams College in the wake of the defection of Pres. Zephaniah Swift Moore, many faculty members and many students (and many library books?) to start a new college in the Pioneer Valley of central Massachusetts. Asa Burbank (Class of 1797) is elected as the first president of the Society of Alumni.